


The Noise in Her Head

by thesometimeswarrior



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Anxiety, Character Study, Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-05
Updated: 2015-06-05
Packaged: 2018-04-02 23:41:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4078375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesometimeswarrior/pseuds/thesometimeswarrior
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Everyone knows that an Airbender needs air. And she was two the first time she couldn’t find any."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Noise in Her Head

Everyone knows that an Airbender needs air. And she was two the first time she couldn’t find any. Her mommy’s belly was swelling, like it was ready to pop—and another baby would come out. What if there was no time for her? What if Mommy and Daddy threw her away like yesterday’s stale sweet buns? 

_They still care about Jinora since you got here.  
Because she’s so smart and an amazing bender, so of course Daddy loves her and so does Mommy. I don’t stack up._

And the baby would be a good Airbender. It was strong—it already was able to hurt Mommy. Ikki heard her groans and saw her clutching her belly sometimes. What if it really hurt Mommy? What if it was bad? What if, after it got here, it hurt all of them?

Daddy was away on council business in Ba Sing Se, so what if he didn’t come back in time to stop the baby? What if he didn’t come back at all? What if something happened to him?

What if?  
What if?  
_What if?_

Then all of a sudden she couldn’t breathe.  
There was air everywhere, nothing had changed, but she couldn’t breathe.  
She gasped. What if she died? She couldn’t breathe.  
There was too much noise in her head, and she couldn’t breathe.  
She couldn’t breathe.  
_Gasp._ She couldn’t breathe!  
_She couldn’t breathe!_

Mommy, scary baby and all, saw her in trouble and came over, bobbling as quickly as she could. Somehow, she managed to say the right thing, and do the right thing, so that the noise in Ikki’s head quieted just a little, and she was able to find a little air for her lungs. 

Mommy gave her sweet buns that day and put her to bed early. And after Daddy came home a couple days later, they called Aunt Kya, who came from the Southern Water Tribe to help.

“Well, it doesn’t seem like there’s anything physically wrong with her,” said Aunt Kya, after putting Ikki into a pool of spirit water, which made Ikki’s skin feel sorta tingly. “It sounds like it was an anxiety attack.”

“So…it was all in her head?” asked Daddy.

“I didn’t say that,” responded Aunt Kya. “Anxiety’s very real. There’re a lot of people that deal with it. Mom told me that after the Hundred Year War, she started seeing a bunch of patients with it, and a lot of them described attacks like Ikki’s.”

“But Ikki’s never been in a war!” said Mommy. “She’s just a toddler!”

“You don’t need to have been in a war to feel this way,” protested Aunt Kya. “It can just happen sometimes—it’s not anyone’s fault.”

“Will it happen again?” asked Daddy. “What should we do?”

“Well, have you started to teach her to meditate yet?”

Daddy tried to teach her meditation, and Ikki tried to learn. She wasn’t bad at it, but when her head got noisy, meditating didn’t help her make it quiet. So as she got older, she found other ways to cope.

Sometimes, she’d air-scooter around the island for hours at a time until she fell over from exhaustion.

Sometimes, she’d scream so that it was equally noisy both inside and outside of her head—and then when the outside got quiet, so would the inside.

Sometimes, she’d go for walks, muttering to herself all the things that made her head loud, and when she vocalized them, they left. 

Once, when she was nine and on a family trip to the Eastern Air Temple, after Jinora and Meelo said things that made her feel an attack coming on, she ran until she found baby air-bison. She petted them and played with them all night, and finally felt calm by the time Daddy found her in the morning.

Sometimes, it wasn’t enough. Sometimes she still couldn’t find the air. And on those days, her family—Daddy, Mommy, Aunt Kya, Uncle Bumi, Rohan, Korra, even Jinora and Meelo—would be there for her. It wasn’t always easy, but she had a super great family. And despite it all, she was glad to be a part of it.

**Author's Note:**

> At one point in Book II, Ikki says something along the lines of "Aunt Kya is so nice--she always asks how I'm feeling." I was always a bit curious about this and what it meant, and this seemed to make sense.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed!


End file.
